SKIN: One Becomes Two, a dance installation November 7, 2008

Nina Haft & Company presents an evening of dance performance in Berkeley. SKIN: ONE BECOMES TWO is a travelogue inspired by choreographer Nina Haft's recent studies in Israel and the West Bank. The work is an interactive, site-specific installation of dance, music and media that explores what happens when the boundaries of body and land are crossed in times of love and conflict. This sensual, edgy and athletic program will be performed by Haft and her dancers, joined by guest artists on selected evenings: Pappas and Dancers (November 7 & 8) and Al-Juthoor Palestinian Debka Dance Troupe (November 14-16). All performances take place at Shawl Anderson Dance Center in Berkeley, three blocks from Rockridge BART Station.

The installation begins outside the building with the performers moving in and out of view behind windows and doorways. As the audience enters, each person chooses where to go among the rooms of the Shawl Anderson Dance Center, which was once a private residence and now functions as the East Bay's oldest home for dance. Short dance pieces and sound installations run in repeated cycles within each studio, including Haft's acclaimed dance theatre solo "36 Jewish Gestures, for Joe (Goode) with love", the dynamic and tribal "Skirt Around This", along with the premiere of "Pomegranate", "Promenade, Tayelet" and "Neofolkdance." Haft's ensemble work, "SKIN", is presented at the conclusion of the evening, when audience members will be invited to drink tea, eat cherries and join the dancers' in learning some of their movement.

Haft's work in new Jewish performance has been profiled in Dance Magazine and supported by Margaret Jenkins' Dance Lab and the Djerassi Resident Artist Program, where she developed "Mit a Bing, Mit a Boom! A Klezmer Dance. " Haft runs the Dance in Unexpected Places Series, where she "shapes space with a sculptor's savvy" in libraries, dockyards, synagogues, pubs, train stations and cemeteries.

$15 general admission, $12 students & seniors.

Official Website: http://ninahaftandcompany.com